For the seller

Selling vintage audio and hi-fi

A vintage cassette radio

Vintage audio is wanted again: Walkmans, cassette decks, turntables, receivers and speakers from the seventies to the nineties all have their collectors. What decides whether yours is sought after is the maker and model, whether it works, and whether it has been left original. Age and size on their own say very little.

Audio tends to come in systems: the amplifier that was chosen to go with those speakers, the deck that was added later, the headphones, the cables, the manuals in a drawer underneath. That togetherness is worth keeping, and it is the first thing that gets lost when a system is sold off piece by piece.

What makes vintage audio collectable

The maker and the model. Names that were serious then are collected now: the better Japanese makers of the seventies and eighties, the great European speaker and turntable builders, and the design classics. Within one maker, one model can be far more sought after than the next, so the exact model number on the back matters more than the brand on the front.

Personal audio. Walkmans and portable cassette and CD players are their own field now. Early and top-of-the-line Sony models are the ones people look for, and the difference between models looks small until you know it.

Originality. Unmodified equipment with its original knobs, feet, cases and boxes is what collectors want. A recap or repair done properly is fine; a creative one is not.

Whether it works. Working is better, but audio that has stood still for twenty years is normal. Belts perish, capacitors age and switches oxidise. It only needs saying honestly.

Before you sell

  • Do not power up equipment that has been unused for decades just to test it. Old capacitors can fail the moment power hits them, and that one switch-on can do real damage.
  • Do not clean with contact spray, oil or polish. Dust is harmless; the wrong spray is not.
  • Keep pairs and systems together. Speakers belong in pairs, and a system that lived together says more together.
  • Keep the boxes, manuals, remotes and cables. With personal audio, the original case and box matter a great deal.

The ways audio can go

Selling it yourself means shipping, and shipping is where vintage audio suffers: heavy amplifiers, fragile cones and glass dials. Packing it properly is a craft of its own.

A dealer takes what plays and sells quickly, and rarely wants the rest.

One buyer for all of it is what we do. We take the whole collection, the system that worked and the deck that did not, and the story of how it was put together goes with every piece to its next owner, with the collector's name on it. Audio sits in our Sound & screen room alongside cameras and consoles, sold as the collector's pieces they are.

Wherever it stands

We are based in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, and buy collections anywhere in the world. Audio is exactly the kind of collection we prefer to come to: we pack it ourselves, properly, so nothing travels badly. Smaller collections can be sent, insured and arranged by us.

Short answers

Are vintage stereos worth anything?

Many are sought after again, some seriously. The exact model decides it, so start with the model number on the back, not the brand on the front.

Is an old Walkman worth anything?

Often, yes. Sony's early and top models are collected worldwide, and original cases and boxes count.

Does it all need to work?

No. Untested and silent for years is normal. Do not power anything up specially for us.

Do you buy single pieces?

No, only collections: roughly twenty objects and up, or fewer if they are exceptional.

Why we keep the story

A collection is not a pile of objects.

It is years of somebody deciding what was worth keeping, and sold off piece by piece that is the first thing to go. So before anything is sold, we sit down with you and record it: how it started, what the best of it was, the piece that got away. That story stays on every object with the collector's name, and goes with it to whoever keeps it next. You get a page where you can see where each piece ended up.

Three ways the story gets recorded

On camera, where it lives. We travel to the collection and film it properly: you talking about how it started, the room and the shelves as they are, the objects in your hands. Wherever in the world the collection happens to be.

On a call. If the collection is sent to us rather than collected, we have the same conversation over a video call and write it up, with one photograph of the shelf as it stood.

In writing. If you would rather not talk at all, answer a handful of questions in your own time and in your own words. It goes on the objects exactly as you wrote it.

It never changes anything else, and you can always say no to it. Some conversations run ten minutes, some an afternoon. Read the collections we have taken on

If it is a whole collection

We buy whole collections, not single pieces: one person takes all of it, and the story is kept with every object. Tell us what you have and a person replies within two days.

How passing it on works, in full

1The collection
What is in it
Pick everything that applies. Something else opens a line to tell us.
Roughly how many pieces
A guess is fine. Nobody has counted.
How would you describe it
There is no wrong answer here, and a lot of ordinary is a normal collection.
One or two sentences. This is the question we care about most.
2Where it is, and how it could reach us
Town and country is enough.
How could it reach us
Unseend is in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Sending and bringing are as welcome as a visit; if it is sent, we pay the freight and insure it.
When does it need to be gone
No hurry is a good answer. It lets us plan a visit properly.
3Condition and photographs
In your own words. Broken, incomplete or untested is fine and is normal; it only needs saying.
Photographs
Three to ten photographs The room and the shelves as they stand. Phone photographs are fine, and a slow walk round on video says more than any of them.Send them to hello@unseend.com
Or attach them to the reply that comes back within two days. Any of them works, and nothing is looked at until a person reads it. Do not clean up first — the shelves as they stand tell us more than a tidy arrangement.
4The number, and the story
A number or a range, whatever you have in mind. You will get an honest answer either way.
Would you tell the story of it
Filmed at the collection wherever it is, on a video call, or written in your own time. It never changes the price.
5How to reach you
The reply comes here, from a person, within two days.
Only if you would rather be called.

Answered within two days, by the person who would come, and by email at every step after that. Nothing you send is shared with anyone, and your photographs are deleted if we do not go ahead.

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